New Times / Letter To The Editor

The following article was posted on January 8th, 2014, in the New Times - Volume 28, Issue 24 [ Submit a Story ]

The following articles were printed from New Times [newtimesslo.com] - Volume 28, Issue 24

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No promises to live in the past, present, and future

By Dave Raleigh - San Luis Obispo

Otis Page attempts to justify his anti-gay beliefs as being based on scripture (“Who’s intolerant now?” Jan. 2).

Of course, innumerable crazies throughout history would say the same, from the Crusades to the Inquisition to the 9/11 hijackers. The preacher/slave trader Cotton Mather was not engaged in a filthy, murderous racket, to hear him tell it. Rather, he was doing the Lord’s work, bringing the heathen to Jesus.

It is laughable that Mr. Page and others of the Right, whose social policies are indistinguishable from those of the pre-visitation Ebenezer Scrooge, accuse their critics of being anti-Christmas and anti-Christian.

Scrooge, of course, made no pretense that this social outlook had a theological basis, so he was free to change his mind and his heart when the visiting spirits showed him the error of his ungenerous ways. But Mr. Page, unfortunately, makes it clear that he is open to no such epiphany.